


The Press Conference

by Juceisloose



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman: The Telltale Series (Video Game)
Genre: Cuddling, First Kiss, Fluff, Idiots in Love, M/M, public coming out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-20
Updated: 2018-06-20
Packaged: 2019-05-26 00:00:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14988374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Juceisloose/pseuds/Juceisloose
Summary: Bruce is donating a hefty sum of money to improve Arkham Asylum, and he has to attend a press conference about it. Regina gives him a speech, but he decides to tell Gotham why he really wants to improve Arkham Asylum: John Doe.





	The Press Conference

**Author's Note:**

> This a short, shit thing I wrote to take a break from the sequel to Eloquence I'm writing. I hope it's semi enjoyable anyway XD

****“You remember what to do, don’t you, Bruce?”

Bruce smiled at the chairman of the board of Wayne Enterprises indulgently. She was anxiously sweeping her eyes over a jittering clutter of press, each huddled close enough it would be impossible to tell where someone ended and someone else began without the hint of different coloured clothes. He couldn’t blame her anxiety, and therefore tried not to get vexed she’d asked the same thing four times, not including when she’d emailed him that morning. He had been doing press conferences and intimate one-on-one interviews since his parents had died, and he’d never been able to prevent the perpetual cold sensation in his belly, like chilled stones festering in his intestines – what if he said the wrong thing and defiled his image, or they asked him something he could not answer? The incident with Vicki Vale a year ago had done nothing to help. His relationship with the press, and Gotham’s people in general, had been incredibly frail since. “Read the flashcards,” he recited, feeling like he was monotonously following a script. She nodded, some of the tension bleeding from her shoulders; she even closed her eyes. “Don’t worry about it, Regina.” He squeezed her delicate shoulder, which contrasted with her – she was not a delicate woman. “Everything will be okay.”

Regina nodded an obviously half-hearted agreement, more like she was trying to convince herself than assure him. “This is greatly appreciated, Bruce. You’re making the right call, giving this money to Arkham Asylum. It’s barely been scraping itself through inspections for years. It’s on its last leg.”

The memory of a guard giving two hostile inmates a Taser because of a few given bucks swam behind each eyelid; of a certain inmate that was most prominent in his mind’s theatre, marred by bruises, gorgeous skin ruined by rash brutality. He sensed that Arkham Asylum was corrupt to the core: the staff, the conditions, the building. A few thousand dollars was not going to change the most important part of Arkham’s negativity, and to try scrape that defiled core from the asylum would do about as good as Bruce standing on top of a rooftop and screaming he was The Batman.

But, still, he simply said, “I hope you’re right, Regina.” And he charmed her with a comforting smile, just to diffuse the air.

She mustered a tiny smile back. “It’s time to go up, Bruce.” Absentmindedly, she adjusted his tie. It was green with purple diamonds, one that had gotten the undivided attention of John Doe when he’d routinely visited him that morning before John’s morning therapy session. He hadn’t even properly registered he’d bought it when he’d gone suit shopping – something he had to do now Alfred was gone. It had been a rash, thoughtless gesture, which showed just how deeply he’d been influenced by recent events: he was not a thoughtless person, and he certainly never did things in the spur of the moment without thinking it through, even when it came to mundane things like buying ties. “Remember. Stick to the cards.”

Bruce squeezed her shoulder again before stepping up and taking his place by the microphone. The mentioned cold pit he’d come to expect burst open like a hydrated flower inside his hollowed intestines, and he welcomed it. He let the feeling remind him he was not just alive but conscious, and the eyes on him were very much real, as well as the hum of chatter and the snap of cameras. He inhaled – and he smiled. Flattered camera flashes waned his pupils. “My father,” he started, drumming his fingers against the wood near his hands, “did terrible things while in Arkham.”

The press leaned closer, clinging ravenously to each word.

“He unjustly convicted sane and innocent people, stole their land and injected them with something to make them act violently so he could support his inexcusable lies. He stole their lives. He stole their belongings. He stole parents from children, children from parents – he took, and he never gave. It’s my turn to give.” He turned to the next card, feeling like there was a chunk of flesh in his throat that was engorging like a sponge. “Arkham Asylum is”- _corrupt_ -“a facility that has needed financial aid for years. Staff are underpaid and overworked, and the building is in desperate need of a modern improvement to keep from falling apart. It is a necessary facility as much as the GCPD and Gotham Central, so I’ve decided to donate thousands of dollars to make sure criminals are taken off the streets and given the help Gotham should be able to provide.”

  
There was scattered applause, but it sounded like it came from underwater.

“When I was eight years old, my mother and father took me to the theatre.” The memory scorched his throat and stung his eyes, even after many years of incomplete healing, and many speeches with the same story. This wasn’t the first time someone had told him to manipulate it for the sake of pity. “I’d already seen the show we went to see three times, but my mother and my father went behind my back and paid for a private viewing just so I could see it again. They loved me.” His trembling fingers moved the top card to the back. It was strange how that memory was so vivid it felt like it had happened yesterday, but more recent memories were faded like they’d happened when he’d been eight. He didn’t think the image of their bodies would ever fade, even if he prayed. “As we were leaving, my mother and father were shot while I watched, unable to do anything but scream as their ethereal lives bled between my ethereal fingers. And it was a man like men in Arkham who stood over their corpses, holding the weapon that had snuffed their presences in my childhood from existence in just that split second when he’d pulled the trigger. Maybe, if someone else had reached out to help Arkham at the time, this incident wouldn’t have happened, and I’d have them with me today. Criminals like these can stay off the streets if only Arkham is improved...” He trailed off. Press blinked at him expectantly, small notepads draped over their laps. “You know what? To hell with it.”

And he threw the flashcards over his shoulder. Regina returned his apologetic stare with a startled one.

“Yes, my parents were killed,” Bruce continued vehemently, and now he could feel the tremors shooting from his fingers to the roots of his arms. “But that wasn’t why I donated money to Arkham Asylum.”

In an instant, he was lathered by questions, different octaves of voices shifting over his. He frowned, but, before he could say anything, Regina was there, encouraging silence into the microphone. Flashing a timid, grateful half-smile, he looked at her with some difficulty, and she returned his stare evenly. Eventually, she sighed and averted her eyes. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Bruce.”

Bruce waited for her to return to her position and for the press to settle down. “As I was saying,” he murmured, collecting his thoughts. “I didn’t donate to Arkham because of the man that killed my parents. Yes, he was sick, and yes, if he was alive now I would love to see him fester behind bars, but, when I decided to help improve Arkham, I was not thinking about keeping malicious men and women off the streets more than the other consequences of an improved medical facility. We focus too much on punishment – on the idea that demented criminals need to be forced within padded walls, confined from our society. This way of thinking can even make us want to keep Arkham as it is, because surely these people deserve it, people who have killed and killed again. We don’t pay attention to the people who deserve help, the ones who love and who are loved, the ones who deserve a normal life as much as any other man or woman.”

He looked straight into one of the cameras. His adrenal glands were pulsing adrenaline in shoots of motion between his wrists and his heart and his stomach. He felt vulnerable and butchered to the bone marrow. He felt like he was exposing a filthy secret, or scraping away the armour he had taken industrious years to develop. He felt itchy and hot, caged in his own skin. But he knew, somewhere not too far away, familiar eyes had just returned his gaze, and that was enough.

“Have you ever been in love?”

Bruce wasn’t particularly sure who or what he was talking to anymore, but he knew his voice came out softer than it should have.

He inhaled. “Not too long ago, someone I’m in love with was put in Arkham Asylum who taught me something vital during our brief time together: people are not inherently evil, and that includes people who happen to be sick. I’ll say it again – people who are sick are _not_ inherently evil people, but rather people who were encouraged to make devastatingly wrong decisions or act based on helpless side effects of their illness. The man I fell in love with”-now he had to talk over the uproar of questions, but he wasn’t paying attention to them anymore-“was not an evil person, not because of his impulses or the voices in his head. He was the most beautiful, sweetest soul I have ever encountered, bred and placed here by someone who finally thought I deserve to stop having a life of shit.” He got some laughs, and he would have laughed too had he not felt like doing that would let moisture squeeze from his eyes. “He was always curious. He was kind to those he adored. He cared. He had such juvenile fascination for the world. He was not an evil person, but he is in Arkham Asylum as we speak, a run-down medical facility with corrupt staff and treatment. With proper treatment and good influences in his life, he could live a normal life, a peaceful one, with – with me.” He took a break. This was the closest he’d ever gotten to crying in public. It wasn’t dignified or pretty. “I don’t want to focus on the criminals people think should be dished a fate far worse than Arkham. I want to focus on the people who are loved as dearly as I love this man, people in that asylum like an old friend of mine, who were good people, good people without inherently bad bones in their body, who succumbed to illness before they had a chance to live. And that’s why I donated to Arkham Asylum. I donated because they deserve help. They deserve a chance to be weaned back into society. They don’t deserve to suffer.” He stepped back. “Thank you.”

He got down before anyone could say a thing. Regina looked like she didn’t know what to feel.

“That was brave,” she eventually said.

Bruce wondered if he should regret coming out on national television when he’d barely accepted his sexuality himself. “No,” he disagreed. “It wasn’t very brave.”

“You don’t know what the media might say, Bruce. After last year – well, I just want what’s best for you.”

“He’s what’s best for me,” he told her with no uncertainty, and left her behind in favour of having a cold shower, a microwave meal and some time to think.

***

Bruce wasn’t sure what he’d expected. Definitely not to be kissed and hugged just like that, or slapped until his face coloured – but he hadn’t expected this, either, the ignorance and the passive-aggressive hostility. He should have, he realised. This wasn’t a fairytale.

John was animatedly pacing around the room like a caged animal, and he hadn’t looked at Bruce once, who was sitting on John’s bed, his back against the wall. He’d said nothing since Bruce had arrived, not even ‘hello’, and, considering Bruce had arrived twenty minutes ago, it was starting to get concerning.

“John?” Bruce prompted. John’s face twitched, but he didn’t react otherwise. “What’s wrong?”

Finally, John growled and threw himself onto the bed. They sat side by side, close enough to touch. Bruce could smell him, musky and familiar – a ‘male scent’, more spicier than the average female’s scent, who mainly masked their natural scent with perfume, anyway, at least the ones he’d spoken to before in events. He took it as a good sign, at least, that most of their proximity had been closed, and that John was finally acknowledging he was there.

“I watched the news.”

Bruce had gathered that; John always did. He knew John had been keeping up with him in the media for years; he’d confessed as much at Ace Chemicals. In fact, he’d been relying on him to be his audience. “I don’t understand,” he admitted.

John growled again – it was almost cute, but the anger it was laced with was not cute, not slightly – and draped himself over the edge of his bed on his stomach, fishing around underneath the furniture for something.

“What are you doing?” Bruce asked curiously. He had the irrational mental image of John pulling out a gun and burying a bullet into Bruce’s stupid head before he could register he was holding a gun at all, but, despite everything, the thought struck him as particularly ridiculous – ridiculous enough he almost felt giggles gurgling up his throat. And, besides, Arkham wouldn’t let him have a gun.

Would they?

Subconsciously, he glanced in the direction of the orderly, concealed by the shut door. He wasn’t so sure.

Telling himself he wasn’t doing it to be wary, he angled himself to try see what John was doing. He seemed to be rummaging inside a plastic box, a large one intended for things like toys, and Bruce could blearily see some kind of stuffed black thing, a limp doll of sorts, photos in cheap frames and newspaper clippings. Before he could think about other ways to angle himself so he could see more, something slapped his lap, and he looked down at the gentle weight.

It was a newspaper. Some pages were ripped and curled, most were discolouring, and on Bruce’s face, on the photograph on the front page, there was a dried stain of something. Next to photograph Bruce, Harvey Dent was unmarred.

The article was about when Bruce had officially announced he was supporting Harvey to be mayor. Both of them were smiling: Harvey was smiling properly, with teeth and radiant eyes, but Bruce was smiling a kind of tight-lipped smile, and if he looked close enough he could see he was holding his mobile phone behind his back. Bruce couldn’t remember holding it, or why he had been. Seeing Harvey was painful, but it didn’t amount to the pain he’d felt when John had broken down, and Bruce felt guilty about it every day. Harvey was in the same building as them, so close Bruce could almost feel his energy. He’d never visited him, not once.

He was confused now, though, guilt aside. John was so angry he was practically snarling as he breathed, his teeth bared, flashing in the dodgy, lemony lights overhead.

“Did he... do something to you?” Bruce asked, which wasn’t entirely unreasonable, but that didn’t explain why he’d mentioned the news. He wasn’t on edge by John’s anger, not as much as he should have been, and it was mostly because his mind was reeling with questions.

John snorted bitterly, seeming somehow angrier, and launched himself onto his feet. He paced the room. “How long?”

“What?” Bruce said stupidly.

“How long have you been in love with him for?” John threw up his hands. One of them was still bandaged, which was Bruce’s fault. It was miraculous he could actually still work it. They struck his thighs with a sharp slap. “I’m supposed to be your _best friend._ Does that count for nothing anymore?” His face contorted, and he pushed something over. Bruce was now a little alarmed. He didn’t want to be kicked out. “I had to find out over the news! The _news_!”

Bruce was well and truly _baffled_. He just stared at him for the longest time, not breathing, and then he realised. He realised, and he laughed so hard it physically hurt, partly because he was so surprised. Actually, mostly because he was so surprised, with the other reasons being he was exhausted, worn and running on caffeine and sugar.

John watched the outburst in confusion, evidently trying to school his expression back into exasperation, but finding it quite difficult. Eventually, despite his best efforts, his eyebrow crawled up his face. “Are you drunk, buddy?”

“I’m not in love with Harvey!” Bruce let his giggles trail off, and he hiccupped for breath. His face ached. “And I never was,” he added for good measure.

“You were,” John retorted, more perplexed than stubborn.

Bruce was still a little giggly. God, he needed more than two hours of sleep. “No.”

The confusion etched into John’s face deepened. “But-”

Bruce waited patiently. He knew he could lose him, lose everything, but he told himself he should deal with that only if it came. The thought of losing one of the last people he had was nauseating.

“Oh.” John’s voice was soft; the confusion in his face slowly receded. Bruce held his breath. “Oh, buddy...” He sat down, spindly limbs angling towards Bruce. “Oh, Brucie, I... I... I love you, too.”

Bruce was sure, after the shock wore off, he initiated the kiss that followed, but his mind was webbed by fragments of delighted gold, and he couldn’t be sure. John’s lips were soft, softer than they looked, and pliable, submitting to Bruce’s tongue when it probed. He tasted like remnants of Arkham food – slop – and, strangely enough, spearmint. He was all angles, no curves, like a model, and his waist fit in Bruce’s callused hands flawlessly. He could feel the man’s heat seeping through the thin, cheap fabric of his uniform, and, while the fabric was rough, as well as the roof of John’s mouth when he nudged it, his hair was soft, intertwining around his fingers like fur. John purred like an animal with fur, arching his back when Bruce slid his hands under his shirt to caress the small of his back. He couldn’t keep his hands still.

John pulled back first: his eyes were hooded, and Bruce could very, very faintly see a shadow of pink dusting his cheeks. Bruce’s own lips felt swollen. The inside of them were seasoned by John’s saliva. He licked it away.

“So,” John breathed in undivided awe, touching Bruce’s jaw; stubble was shadowing there, barely noticeable, because Bruce had been too drained to groom himself that morning, “that’s what it’s like to kiss Bruce Wayne.” He pulled Bruce’s bottom lip down with his thumb. It made a moist sound when John let go and it recoiled. “I always wondered...”

Bruce shivered inside the stiflingly hot room. It ripped down his spine and ended at the tips of his fingers. “Are you disappointed?” he asked. His voice was throaty, almost sickly, but John looked at him with eyes a fraction wider like he’d said something dirty.

And then he laughed, sensitive to the orderly outside: breathy, restrained giggles just higher than a whisper. “Batsy,” he crooned. “You’re so cute.”

Bruce didn’t know what to say. He supposed, for now, there wasn’t much _to_ say, even if two guys, who were friends and sometimes on different sides of the Law, didn’t commonly kiss in corrupt asylums during the drifting prologue of the night hours. Outside, the sky was a litter of pastel pinks and oranges.

“So, erm, buddy,” said John, rubbing the back of his neck. He used his injured hand, Bruce noticed. He wondered how well it was healing. “Mind if I steal another one of those?”

Before Bruce could help himself, he said, “You can’t steal something that rightfully belongs to you”, and got the reward of seeing the surprise in John’s face before it was masked by a radiant beam.

“Aw, Brucie! I knew you were a softy! Mine?” John repeated like was waiting for a confirmation, and slid his arms around his neck, sending static tingles over Bruce’s skin.

“Yours.”

That was enough for John, who pressed their mouths together. Their kisses started lazy and unhurried while they tenderly pawed each other’s faces and treasured each other’s infinite textures, but they soon changed to hotter and sloppier kisses, with their hands clinging to flesh, hair, whatever they could get handfuls of.

Bruce finally lowered John onto his uncomfortable, springy mattress, and John graciously took him between his legs, his hands knotting into Bruce’s jacket. His inner thighs, when they dug into Bruce’s waist, were warm, warmer than his face, his waist. He revelled in it, as well as the shivers he was gifted with when he touched them, following the slope of soft flesh wonderingly with his fingertips, devoid of blemishes. In that moment, while they kissed lazily and explored each other for the first time, he was unsure how he had ever struggled with loving a man. It was so natural. Loving John was so natural.

John’s skin burned under his mouth as he feverishly pushed up his thin uniform shirt and scattered his kisses along the patient’s prominent ribs. With tender concern, he followed the shape of his ribcage, feeling John tremble under his mouth, his tongue, but he said nothing. He would ask about it later.

His heart felt fit to burst, and he’d never experienced anything like it. This wasn’t emotionless lust; this was a physical craving for physical love – a craving to worship angles and white softness galore, and explore, memorize, store everything to memory. He kissed his waistband–

“Wait.” The interruption was more breath than voice.

Bruce recoiled so quickly his head spun. John was a sight to devour: all splayed out, his bare torso heaving with every inhale, bright colour shadowing his unnaturally chalky skin. But there was an expression on his face, something like torment, despair or panic, or maybe a combination. Panic lit Bruce’s nerve endings where passion had once forked. “Did I do something wrong?”

John shook his head so hard his hair bobbed.

“Did I hurt you?” Bruce prompted. His stomach felt unpleasantly swollen.

Another shake.

“Do we need to stop?”

John said nothing, but the answer was clear. Bruce moved off him, adjusting his tie and his jacket, wondering if he had done something wrong after all. Dismay drowned disappointment, leaving no room for it. His stomach heaved when he thought of doing something to hurt him. Just the fact he’d made him uncomfortable at all was hard to swallow.

“I’m sorry, John.”

John sat up, and pulled down his shirt. His lips were swollen. With tender caution, Bruce leaned over to give them a very sweet, very brief kiss: a physical apology. To his relief, John didn’t push him away. “You didn’t do anything, buddy!” he assured, finally finding his voice. It chased away some of the unease inside Bruce. “I just... haven’t done this before, you know?” He averted his eyes and rubbed the back of his papery neck. “I just-” He made a sound almost like a tut. “I want it to be special, you know? Outside of Arkham, after we’ve... I don’t know...”

“Gotten used to each other?” Bruce suggested. John nodded, fisting the crisp bedsheets. “Yeah. Me, too, John.”

“You’re not mad?” John peeked at him from under his eyelashes, hope and apprehension sparking in his eyes.

“Your comfort is as important as mine, John,” Bruce pointed out calmly. His breathing had basically evened out now, but the kissing had left him dizzy. “Don’t ever feel guilty for not feeling like giving consent. You have the right.”

John reached out for his hand, and Bruce slid it into his. The patient used the momentum to pull Bruce towards him. “Geez, buddy... Hold me? Please.”

In the end, John held him, and Bruce left his ear on his heart, listening to the irregular thrums that endearingly speeded whenever Bruce turned his head to tenderly kiss his breast. They shared warmth pleasantly.

Finally, after a few minutes, John asked, “Did you fall asleep, buddy?”

“No.”

“Visiting hours end soon.” John gave a pause as Bruce sighed. “You know that mojo you do to get in here?”

Bruce was a little amused. “Bribing?”

“Do it again,” John pleaded. “To stay.”

“I will,” Bruce promised. Underneath him, John was practically purring. “But we have so much time, John. I’ll be here tomorrow. And the next day. And the day after that...”

And he was.

 


End file.
